in the days ahead. president obama also spoke last nightwithegyptpresidentmohamed morsi about working together to preserve peace and security in the region. tension between israel and egypt's new islamist government has increased since the attacks with egypt recalling its ambassador to israel in protest. richard haass, also an emergency meeting of the u.n. security council last night. sift through this for us. how big is this? how significant is this in the middle east right now? >> well, it's big for lots of reasons, because it's not happening in isolation. one is you have the largest military clashes between israel and hamas in, what, four year now, and it's not going to stop. at times it doesn't matter in the middle east exactly why things begin. over the last few months there have been hundreds of rocket attacks, now this, then retaliation. it just happens. second of all, it's happening in the absence of anything political. there's no dialogue going on whatsoever between israelis and palestinians. this can't substitute for this. thirdly, egyptians withdrew their ambassador. since

, michael steele and jonathan capehart onset as well. rick stengel went to interview the presidentofegypt. obviouslyhe's the man at the center of all the action in the middle east right now. we're all trying to figure out who he is. i learned something by reading "time" magazine. i found out he's a usc grad and still a trojans fan. little known fact. >> always start with the important parts of life. >> i'm sure he's very upset with what happened with the notre dame game. more importantly, who is this man who seems to be an accidental president who suddenly feels very comfortable with seizing power in the most important arab state in the planet? >> it's really interesting. this interview done by rick stengel and my colleagues is amazing because it sheds some light on this man who is really an ig enigma. he's walking var fine line between hard core islamists and others in the middle east. one of the most interesting things in the interview is how he feels about the u.s. that's been a big question mark for everyone here. what is this man's relationship to the u.s. what is our relationship w

article, "new yorktimes,"egypttumult,a rift emerges in morsi's team. morsi, who is part of the muslim brotherhood, they say hey, you know what? we're not going to be involved in the process. we're just going to sit back here. we're going to read our koran. and we're just going to sit back. suddenly they decide we're going to be involved in the process, which is all right. and then we see this weekend, morsi is seizing power that he doesn't have. egypt's about to get really ugly again. >> you know, i think that you see the pushback in the streets. morsi's not going to be able to get away with everything that he wants to get away with. they've turned a corner. >> what's his justification for seizing all of this power illegally? >> hubris. the guy -- he had just helped broker a deal in gaza, and he felt that he had some running room with the americans because he, you know, had essentially done our bidding. >> he's got the president of the united states calling him, the american secretary of state. >> that kind of goes to your head. >> yeah. i'm a big guy. >> you know, you live half your

downwithegypt's presidentin cairo. we'll be following that as well. >>> all right. coming up on "morning joe" -- former national security adviser dr. brzezinski. hardball's chris mathews, dan senor back on the show, and actor john o'hurley will be here with two special guests to preview thursday's popular national dog show. up next, mike allen with this morning's politico playbook. but first, bill karins with a check on the forecast. >> good wednesday pomonk to you. busy travel day. the last thing we needed was a large area of the country with heavy fog. i expect significant problems in the midwest. the northeast, clouds are moving out, just like yesterday in many areas. no travel concerns whatsoever for all of the busy i-95 cities. airports are off to a good start and they should remain that way during the day. of course be there can be some volume issues because of so many people. that's about it. nice forecast and the winds should remain light. your flight should be a relatively uneventful flight in the eastern seaboard. to the problem area, areas of gray, dense fog adviso

there in the middle east. you've got syria, the iranian nuclear thing, the constitutional struggle withanegypt. youpotentially have jordan getting in the mix. plus you've now got the oldest of the issues, the israel israeli/palestinian issue. this is facing barack obama at a time he wants to do more in asia, deal with the fiscal cliff. welcome to your second term. >> a lot to do. richard haa ss. >> how did jerry adams do it? how did the irish terrorists as they were called before the peace deal, how did they not only enforce the peace but then turn to their own bad elements and say, step out of line, and we're going to crush you. >> one was, they couldn't shoot their way to power. tony blair, the irish prime minister gave them a political path that was legitimate. there was a potential there for compromise. they had discipline in their own ranks. >> how did they do that? how would hamas discipline the extremists? >> at some point -- listen, in the history of every opposition movement, there's a time when there's a civil war where people who want to compromise have to deal with the radicals who don